‘This is ridiculous. You can’t just keep a whole part of yourself cut off from us, we’re your family. Why do you think our teenage daughter only comes to me when she has a problem? Why do you think Lloyd won’t talk to us about what’s going on at school? You’re so closed off, Flick, you need to let us in. We’re your family. It’s supposed to be us against the world and it really doesn’t feel that way.’

‘I know, and I’m sorry. I need to go back though; I need to confront those demons or I will never be able to change. I can’t help the way I am.’

‘Well, you need to try, or you are going to lose those kids.’

‘I wasn’t always like this. Maybe finally going home will help me work through my issues – like you wanted me to.’ I don’t leave him any room to protest. ‘I’ll arrange for an after-school club for Lloyd and go down tonight. It’s the last couple of weeks of term anyway, it’s not like they do any proper classes. Daisy will be all right with him ’til you get home from work.’

‘It’s that important?’

‘I wouldn’t ask you if it wasn’t. Please, Chris, just let me do this. I promise when I get back I’ll tell you everything.’

‘Why now? What’s this about the missing girl? Do you know her?’

I hesitate. ‘No, but when I was at school a girl went missing. I was with her the night she disappeared.’

‘Jesus, why didn’t you tell me?’

‘I find it hard to talk about the past, you know I do,’ I say.

‘Did the police ever find out what happened to her?’

‘No. She vanished without a trace.’

There’s a tiny part of me that hopes that I am wrong, a part of me that hopes there is no connection between the two disappearances. The news report has forced me to remember that summer when everything changed. I try not to think about that time and I have never spoken about it since, especially not to Chris. It’s a secret I have kept locked away. But there is no hiding from it anymore.

I have to go back.

Chapter Two

Then